It takes being together to remember the sacredness of family.  While photographs too serve as a good reminder, they are only secondary to the moment experienced, well before anyone had a chance to snap a picture.  Not to mention that the act itself of being together is far more honest than a photograph ever could be.  We naturally pick our favorite images, those that pull most tenderly on our heart strings, and rightfully so.  Yet the moments themselves, even though likely mixed with both laughter and tears, turn our hearts not to the pristine but to the sacred.  That deep connection of life and relationship to the very God that created us, and revealed through those closest to us.  Where we are consistently exposed by our flaws yet infinitely moved by love without condition.  Where we are struck by the nurturing that comes naturally yet humbled by the reactions that leave us offering less grace than we would ever give ourselves.  The sacred, God’s mysterious zealousness over mankind, is not understood in the sentimental sigh of flipping through photographs, but in the tension of experiencing the greatest gifts we will ever be given.